Jericho’s large hands, ones that looked capable of killing a man unaided, were clenched at his sides. As if he was resisting the need to either kiss her or put her over his knee and spank her.

  Marisha felt the heat of color enter her cheeks at the realization she would probably enjoy doing either or both those things with this man.

  The things Sergei had implied in regard to the two of them enjoying kinky sex together had made Marisha feel ill.

  The thought of doing those things with Jericho gave them a whole different meaning and increased the burning heat between her thighs.

  There was a raw sexuality to Jericho in both his voice and eyes, and in the way his muscular body filled out his tailored jacket.

  He was a savage inside an Armani suit.

  One who could lash out totally without warning.

  Marisha moistened her suddenly dry lips with the tip of her tongue. “What are we going to do?”

  His eyes darkened, possibly at her use of the word we. “We’re going to drive up into the mountains and stay there until I know it’s safe for us to leave.”

  Her eyes widened. “We’re going camping?”

  “No.” He chuckled. “There’s a cabin. It even has inside plumbing,” he added mockingly as she looked no less horrified.

  She swallowed. “And wild animals.”

  Jericho shrugged. “Brown bears, cougars, coyotes. Oh, and venomous snakes.”

  Marisha glanced off into the distance as if she could actually see those mountains in the darkness. Which, of course, she couldn’t. But she didn’t doubt they were out there, along with the bears and venomous snakes.

  She didn’t doubt anything Jericho had said to her, including the comment about his “being the one threatening to do the killing.”

  Her gaze returned to him. “You said until it’s safe. Safe for whom?” Her head tilted to the side as she stared up at him searchingly for several long seconds before her brow cleared. “You don’t trust me to be around your employer.” It was a statement, not a question.

  His gaze warmed briefly at her insight before it hardened again. “Should I?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  Her eyes didn’t waver from meeting his. “Because, unlike you, I’ve never killed anyone.”

  Chapter Eight

  Jericho glanced at the sleeping woman sitting beside him in the darkness of the SUV as he drove them up into the mountains.

  Marisha had fallen asleep shortly after they left the private airfield to begin the two-hour drive. A sleep so deep, only the restraint of the seat belt kept her in an upright position.

  The sleep of the exhausted, was Jericho’s guess.

  Giving credence to her claim she had been brought to the US against her will and tortured and starved before and since?

  Possibly. Or it could just mean she’d been doing other things at night when she should have been sleeping.

  Jericho’s jaw tightened at the possibility of what those other things might have been. Just thinking of it was enough to make him want to rip Sergei Federov apart.

  Jericho’s nostrils flared as he recalled the look on Marisha’s face when he’d admitted to being a killer. Instead of looking frightened of him, it was as if he was confirming what she had already known about him.

  Which pissed him the hell off!

  He had killed, yes. But only in self-defense or in the course of protecting Leon. He had never gratuitously inflicted death or pain. Well…apart from on Artur, but as far as Jericho was concerned, he deserved brownie points for having resisted killing the bastard so far.

  He didn’t regret anything he’d done in the past, knew he would do it again in a heartbeat to protect someone he cared about.

  As he care what happened to Marisha?

  His expression softened as he gave her another glance. She looked so damned young. She was young, he corrected himself, possibly in her late teens or early twenties. Too damned young for him to even be looking at her the way he was.

  Killian was fifteen years older than Natalia, he reminded himself.

  Maybe, but Natalia had grown up as a principessa of the Italian Mafia. There had never been any doubt she would marry someone who was also in the life. Well…apart from last year in Killian’s jealous mind, but the feisty Natalia had soon corrected him of that misconception. Natalia was every inch her father’s daughter. Strong. Feisty. Determined to marry the man she loved. Luckily, Leon had approved of that choice.

  Marisha was nothing like Natalia. And Jericho didn’t mean that in a bad way. Natalia was willful and spoiled and had never been denied anything in her life that she wanted. Her saving grace was that she was also kind and beautiful, and so very much in love with Killian.

  Jericho knew next to nothing about Marisha.

  He also had no idea who this Toly was that she’d said Federov had had killed.

  Brother? Boyfriend? Lover?

  Or he could just have it completely wrong and Toly was a female and none of those things.

  He and Marisha needed to have a long conversation as soon as it was convenient for them to do so.

  In the meantime, Jericho could look his fill of the sleeping woman who’d caused his cold heart to throb back to life—sorry for lying, Killian!—the moment he’d first seen her on that security disc.

  Marisha woke on her side in the comfort and warmth of a bed to look out of a window at what appeared to be the half-light of dawn.

  In any case, it was light enough she could see it was no longer night and she wasn’t seated in the SUV next to Jericho, being driven to somewhere in the mountains where there was a cabin with indoor plumbing, but also bears, coyotes, and venomous snakes roaming outside.

  She gave a shudder at the thought of the latter.

  “You’re awake.”

  Marisha gave a startled gasp before she hurriedly turned onto her back to look at the man who had spoken in that now-familiar Irish lilt.

  Jericho Price was lying in the bed beside her, the sheet only covering him to his waist, revealing bare, hard washboard abs.

  Marisha couldn’t help but become distracted by all that visible naked and tanned flesh. There was sprinkling of dark red hair across the top of his chest and pecs, the nipples the color of a brand-new English two-pence piece. The muscles of his abdomen were defined, as were those of his arms, one of which he had raised and bent so that it rested behind his head on the pillow beneath him. His auburn hair was slightly tousled, his eyes dark with an unreadable emotion.

  She glanced down at herself, breathing a heartfelt sigh of relief when she saw she was wearing a black T-shirt so large, she guessed it must belong to Jericho. She resisted the impulse to lift the bedcovers to see if she was wearing anything else, guessing that doing so might also reveal Jericho as being completely naked.

  If so, it was a nakedness that didn’t bother him in the slightest. “I keep spare clothes here,” he dismissed, explaining the T-shirt she wore.

  Marisha moistened her lips before speaking. “Is there only one bedroom in this cabin?”

  “Four.”

  She drew in a sharp breath. “But for some reason, the two of us are sharing this one?”

  “Until I know whether or not I can trust you not to try to sneak out in the middle of the night, yes,” he confirmed harshly.

  She gave a snort. “You seriously think I might try to leave here when there are snakes and wild animals outside?”

  He gave a half smile. “I doubt there are any actually waiting at the door to pounce on you when you leave.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “I’m so glad you think my fear of wild animals and snakes is funny. I just live to amuse— What are you doing?” she squeaked as Jericho rolled over, pinning her body to the bed beneath him as he lay between her parted thighs.

  She gave another squeak as he lifted her arms and held them in place above her head by interlinking his fingers with hers.

  So that he didn’t hurt her by placing his fingers about her bruised wrists?

  Marisha shied away from thinking Jericho was being in the least kind. For all that she was no longer being held prisoner in Sergei Federov’s basement, Jericho’s explanation as to why they were sharing a bed said she was still a prisoner. Jericho’s prisoner.

  Having Jericho on top of her made it totally unnecessary for her to check whether they were both naked beneath the bedcovers. They were, and the long length of Jericho’s engorged and throbbing cock was now pressing urgently against the heat of her mound.

  Marisha instantly felt a rush of moisture between her thighs, her nipples having become plump and tingling.

  Something Jericho was very aware of if the way his eyes had darkened was any indication. “What does it feel like I’m doing?” he prompted huskily.

  Marisha swallowed. “I’m not sure.”

  His nostrils flared. “Last night was a shit show from start to finish. Starting with finding you battered and bruised in Federov’s suite. Followed by arriving at the airport in time to take you off his plane and driving the two of us here. You were sleeping so deeply when we arrived that I had to strip you and put you to bed. Which was why the night ended with my seeing each and every one of the bruises those bastards had put on your body,” he added grimly.

  “If that’s so, then why do you still distrust me?”

  Jericho was having to force himself to continue distrusting Marisha.

  Although those livid bruises were making it increasingly difficult for him to believe she could possibly be an assassin come to harm Leon.

  The bruises were mainly on her back, stomach, thighs, and the tops of her arms. Some of them were consistent with a fall; others looked as if they had been deliberately inflicted by hands and booted feet.

  Jericho had been furious when, after carrying the still-sleeping Marisha up the stairs of the cabin, he had undressed her and seen those signs of physical abuse decorating her slender body. He’d wanted to drive straight back to the Brunelli estate and interrogate Artur himself. To show that bastard how much it hurt to be kicked and punched and held too tightly.

  Instead, he’d carefully dressed Marisha in one of his clean T-shirts and then covered her with the bedclothes while he went back downstairs to check on the generator so that they had electricity. He’d lit a fire in the stove so they would have hot water to shower in the morning.

  Marisha hadn’t moved when he went back upstairs to quickly undress and then lie down in the bed beside her and pull the duvet over them both.

  He had no idea whether he was keeping watch on her, as he’d said he was, or if he was protecting her.

  He suspected the latter.

  Lying on top of her now, with the heat of her body pressed against his from her thighs to her breasts, and the sweet honey of her arousal invading his senses, he wasn’t sure he cared one way or the other if only he could thrust his aching cock inside her heat and keep on thrusting until the two of them climaxed.

  “Then persuade me otherwise,” he muttered gruffly.

  Her eyes widened. “You want me to— You expect me to—”

  “Fuck, no, I don’t expect you to give me sexual favors in return for leniency!” Jericho glowered.

  Just because she was laid out for him like some exotic buffet and his cock was hard enough to hammer nails didn’t mean he expected her to have sex with him. He’d like it if she did, had no doubt he would enjoy it, but it wasn’t a requirement.

  His nostrils flared. “What I want is for you to answer my questions honestly.”

  “How will you know I’m telling the truth?”

  Good point, Jericho acknowledged appreciatively. “Let’s start with a couple of easy ones and go from there. How old are you?”

  “Twenty-one.”

  Too fucking young for a thirty-six-year-old cynic!

  “Who is Toly?”

  Her lashes lowered. “A friend.”

  “What sort of friend?”

  “We lived together in Oxford for three years while I attended university.”

  Jericho’s jaw tightened at the admission, but also because he could tell Marisha was choosing her words carefully and no longer looking at him directly. “How old was Toly?”

  “Thirtyish.”

  His eyes narrowed. “More than a friend, then.”

  “No. I… It’s complicated.”

  His mouth twisted without humor. “He returned to Russia with you after the two of you lived together for three years?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you think Federov then had him killed?”

  Her bottom lip began to tremble. “Artur taunted me with it, yes.”

  “Why would they keep you alive but kill your friend?”

  Her teeth bit into that bottom lip to stop it from trembling even more, tears glistening in those mesmerizing blue eyes. “I have no idea.”

  Jericho breathed out heavily. “Okay, so the only questions you answered honestly was your age and Toly’s, and that you and Toly lived together for three years prior to the two of you returning to Russia.”

  Her eyes widened. “I didn’t lie when I said he was my friend.”

  “And lover?”

  “No!” she insisted forcefully.

  She really wasn’t lying about that, Jericho realized as he recognized the gleam in her eyes as indignant anger. How the hell had she and a man aged thirtyish lived together for three years without— “Was Toly gay?” Surely it was the only explanation for a man of that age living with someone as young and beautiful as Marisha and not making love to her.

  She gave him a reproving grimace. “I never asked. We didn’t have the sort of friendship where it was any of my business,” she continued impatiently. “It’s normal in university cities for men and women to live together and not be romantically involved with each other.”

  Jericho really wouldn’t know. He’d been too busy after he left school at sixteen trying not to get killed by rival gangs on the streets of Dublin. Becoming a very junior member of the Irish Mob had been the only thing that saved him and his brothers and cousin. Until that too became a life-or-death situation after the hierarchy had ordered his own father and Killian’s killed. The four sons of those two men had needed to get out of Ireland for good after that.

  Marisha wasn’t sure where Jericho’s thoughts had taken him, but wherever it was they were making him frown. “Is this the way you usually carrying out interrogations?”

  He blinked, his brow clearing as he brought himself out of whatever memories had caused his scowl of unhappiness. “Can’t say I’d want to question Artur while in this position, no,” he drawled.

  Marisha laughed.

  It was the first time she’d found anything humorous in days, she realized. Being kidnapped and thrown down basement stairs, told her friend Toly was dead, and then to have been flown out of Russia and not even know if Boris was looking for her wasn’t conducive to humor of any kind.

  Once Marisha started laughing, she couldn’t seem to stop. She laughed and laughed until tears streamed down her cheeks and she was no longer laughing but crying. Deep, body-shaking sobs that tore through the last of her defenses.

  She buried her face against Jericho’s hot and comforting chest as she once again sobbed for the loss of Toly and the days and nights of not knowing if she was going to live or die.

  Her sobs deepened as she realized she still didn’t know the answer to that.

  “Hey, it’s okay.” Jericho’s strong arms gathered her up and held her tightly against his chest as he rolled onto his back, taking her with him, so that she was now the one lying on top of him.

  It was the first indication Marisha had that he was no longer constraining her hands on the pillow above her head. She instantly moved her arms down and about Jericho’s shoulders to cling to his solidness as someone would hold on to a rock at the side of a heaving river to stop themselves from being swept away and drowning.

  She felt as if that was what she’d been doing since Federov’s men took her. Except, until now, there hadn’t been any rock she could cling to.

  She wasn’t a coward. She’d learned to survive after her mother and sister died and she was placed with her foster parents. Galina and Pavel Agapov had been kind enough to her, but never allowed themselves to become too emotionally close to her.

  Boris had entered her life when she was sixteen and put Toly in place as her bodyguard, separating her from others of her age group.

  University in England had been Marisha’s first taste of freedom. A freedom that, if she’d known what would happen at the end of those three years, she would have taken full advantage of by never returning to Russia.

  “You’re safe here with me,” Jericho now soothed, one of his large hands caressing reassuringly up and down her back, the other cradling the back of her head to hold her close against his chest. “No one is going to hurt you on my watch. Not again,” he added.

  She drew in a ragged breath “What if Leon orders otherwise?”

  Jericho’s arms tightened. “He won’t.”

  “You can’t know that—” She broke off as his hand curled about her chin and lifted her face until she was looking directly at him.

  “Leon isn’t a monster, and neither am I,” he stated flatly. “We don’t go around hurting women. Nor do we condone anyone else doing so either. Yes, we left you with Federov in his suite earlier, but never with any intention of leaving you there. What we need from you to help you further is for you to tell us the truth about who you are and why the Federovs were holding you prisoner.”

  Marisha couldn’t look away when Jericho’s fingers were holding her chin so firmly, but neither could she tell him the truth. Not when she still didn’t know who she could or couldn’t trust.

  Apart from knowing she could distrust the Federovs and any of their men, of course.

  Unable to look away or release herself from Jericho’s arms, she put an end to his questions in the only way she could think of.

 

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